The following references to and descriptions of prior proposals or products are not intended to be and are not to be construed as statements or admissions of common general knowledge in the art. In particular, the following discussion does not relate to what is commonly or well known by the person skilled in the art, but may assist in the understanding of exemplary versions of the present invention, to which the identification of pertinent prior proposals may be relevant.
In Home Displays (IHDs) are devices which, at their most basic, display to a householder the amount of electrical energy being consumed by the household at an instant in time. IHDs are becoming more common in homes as a way to illustrate to householders what or how much energy they are using at a particular point in time.
The expectation has been that householders will use this information to change behaviour and appliance use habits in order to save energy and hence money.
Also becoming more common in domestic premises are energy management hubs. These devices accumulate information about energy use in a home, and control or facilitate the control of appliances in order to save energy. These energy management hubs may also communicate with external entities such as energy retailers/providers/sources in order to determine energy costs and make or suggest changes in appliance use which lower or minimize energy costs.
These devices are designed to operate autonomously, since the greater the burden on a householder to achieve energy saving outcomes, the greater is the likelihood that a householder will not participate or will not adjust their behaviours.
These devices need an easy way in which to immediately (substantially in real time) communicate to a householder basic information such as excessive energy use and available opportunities for saving money, or simply that everything is going well or otherwise operating normally or within specifications.
Communication with the householder can be undertaken using lights, where information is encoded into such characteristics as light colour or flashing behaviour.
Such lights can be concentrated around a circular button or circular control surface. Thus users have become habituated to the idea that a circular light effect is associated with a control that requires attention. However, with fully autonomous devices, or devices which do not have a local user interface, this association is no longer correct. That is, a light effect may be providing certain information without necessarily inviting input via a user interface (such as by pressing a button), but rather may be intended to advise the user on current or anticipated states so that the user can make more informed decisions regarding future behaviour.